September 12, 2020

Twitter Just Slapped Trump With Another Violation for Spreading Election Disinformation

AP Photo/Alex Brandon

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Twitter put a warning on one of President Trump’s tweets on Saturday morning, in which he encouraged followers to vote twice in North Carolina, which is illegal.

In his tweet, Trump urged people voting by mail in North Carolina to show up to polling sites to make sure that their vote was being counted, and if it wasn’t, to vote again in person. Election officials have specifically warned against doing this, saying that it could cause unnecessarily long lines at polling stations.

This wasn’t the first time the president has encouraged voter fraud: He did the same thing earlier this month, telling supporters in North Carolina to vote twice (both by mail and in-person). “Let them send it in, and let them go vote, and if their system’s as good as they say it is, then obviously they won’t be able to vote,” Trump said. “If it isn’t tabulated, they’ll be able to vote,” 

Users trying to view the tweet on Saturday were first met with a warning from Twitter explaining that the election misinformation tweet is against Twitter’s civic and election integrity rules:

This is only the latest instance of Twitter trying to curb misinformation spread by the President. Twitter put the same warning on a Trump tweet last month in which he said drop boxes for mail-in votes could lead to election fraud. Facebook also said that videos of Trump encouraging people in North Carolina to vote twice would be taken down because the company found them to be in violation of its policies against voter fraud.

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WE'LL BE BLUNT

It is astonishingly hard keeping a newsroom afloat these days, and we need to raise $253,000 in online donations quickly, by October 7.

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